Don't Get the Wrong Idea
by shades of live
Summary: Insomnia's crumby. A thritysomething Holden takes some time out of his night for a smoke and proceeds to think of his job, wife, and all the other great things in life. Please take a look and review!


I don't sleep too hot. It's no big secret. I haven't since I was a kid, and even then I would toss and turn like a madman. I drive my wife crazy, waking up in the middle of the night and all. She's the type of person who will just lay there completely still, and won't move one goddamn inch all night. It kills me, the way she just lays in that same position like that.

That's what happened tonight. I went to sleep at a reasonable time and ended up laying there all wide-eyed and just stared at the wall for a couple of days. I figured it was better to get up and have a smoke and try and get some work done. I'm a writer. The second in my family, actually. My older brother D.B.'s one helluva writer. He used to write short stories and stuff like that, before moving out to Hollywood and all. That's really crumby in my opinion. Having someone who can actually write something decent wasting his talent on the goddamn _movies_, crumby as hell if you ask me.

I remember my mother telling me that the last thing she needed in the family was another writer. She was worried that I'd be writing about _her _and all. To be honest, writing about real people just depresses the hell out of me. It really does. I like writing about things that couldn't really happen. For instance, I had this terrific idea about a guy in a bright orange fedora who was always trying to get someone to dance with him, but no one would because he seemed all cockeyed and all. It really killed me. I damn near laughed all the way home. It's crazy how the best ideas come to you at the strangest times.

Don't get the wrong idea. I mean, I'm not some hot-shot writer or anything like D.B. is. As a matter of fact, I only started doing it to clear my mind. You see, I was always a fantastic writer _in school_, so I would sorta write things down for the hell of it. I still just sorta write things down for the hell of it. Essays and stuff like that. Nothing that would really knock you out or anything, but they're not bad.

I leaned over and I started looking out the window, to try and get some inspiration. Even in the middle of the night it's surprising how much is going on. Not just normal stuff either. It's when all the crazy people start to come out. The one night I was looking out the window, it had to be one maybe two in the morning, and there was a guy in a bathrobe just walking down the street. A goddamn _bathrobe_ for Chrissake! Looking around at the ground like there's going to be a newspaper there or something! It's amazing all the crazy stuff you see in the middle of the night, it really is.

Anyway, sitting here in the dark in front of the typewriter always makes me feel lonely. I mean, I can still see my wife and all. I know she's over in bed not even twenty feet away in that same crazy position, but I still feel just as blue sitting here alone at night. I know it's crazy. Normally I'll sit here and write about two words every goddamn hour. No kidding. I could sit here for hours and just stare out the window doing nothing. It has a lot to do with my insomnia. I can stay up for days, sometimes. Just looking out the same damn window and thinking about everything, but never actually get around to writing a goddamn word. It's crazy, I know.

I guess the good thing about not sleeping is you think of all these crazy questions to ask people. For instance, I've always wanted to ask where those ducks in Central Park South go in the wintertime. I've always wondered that, or why Herbert, an old classmate of mine used to wear the same goddamn tie everyday to class. Or even if old Jane still kept all her kings in the back row. Things like that really get me. But for some reason I can never think to ask them during the day when I'd have the chance. It's always just at night when I'm sitting at the typewriter with nothing else to do but think about all these crumby questions, anyway.

I'm crazy sometimes, I swear to God I am. I swear that I wanted to walk right over to the bed and give it a good shake, just so I could have some other person to talk to. I could see her getting mad though. My wife, that is. She always gets this look on her face when I wake her up. She'll get all smug and start yelling something about how I'm almost thirty and haven't slept a normal night in my whole life. It really knocks me out when she gets all mad like that. Her cheeks start to turn red and she's cute as hell, I won't lie. She gets very cute when she's angry, especially when I get up in the middle of the night. It's really crumby I'll admit, but sometime I'll annoy her just to fool around. I fall in love with her again every time she gets all worked up. I know it's a crumby thing to do and all, but she really drives me half-crazy when she's like that. She really does.

I kinda stretched out and glanced out the window one last time after that. It was going on four o'clock and I'd really done nothing. I didn't really give a damn that I hadn't done anything, but it still seemed like a waste to have sat there all that time and get nothing out of it. I threw the rest of my cigarette out the window and closed it as I stood up. I didn't feel like sleeping yet but I didn't really have another option at that point. There wasn't anything else to do and I wasn't in the mood to write about funny stuff. You really have to be in the mood for that kind of thing.

Then the strangest thing happened. When I got back over to the bed I got the sudden urge to just shake it as hard as I could. I know it was a really crumby thing to do but I didn't care. I walked up to her all ready to do it and everything, but once I got there I didn't really feel like doing it anymore.  
Instead I just kinda leaned over and gave her a kiss on the forehead. I don't know why I did on her forehead, but she opened her eyes all flustered as if it were a goddamn emergency or something.

'Holden? Is everything alright…?'

It was pretty clear that she was still half-asleep when she asked. I mean, it was four o'clock after all. Boy, it's funny. Just that goofy look on her face when she asked made me kind of want to laugh at her, but instead I figured that I should at least ask while I was thinking of it, so that the night wouldn't be a total loss or anything. I smiled suave as hell to try and calm her down a bit, because it wasn't anything important. I just really needed to know at that point:

'Yeah, yeah--hey, I was just wondering…do you still keep your kings in the back row?'

End.


End file.
